Pender's Blog

Lack of a Tablet (and Urgency) Costing Microsoft Big Time

Somebody out there has been doing math. We've heard about how the complete lack of a tablet has hurt Microsoft's mind share and maybe even its market share, but now some pundit out there says that it's hurting Microsoft's bottom line, too.

To the tune of $1 billion, no less. At least that's what one columnist over in the United Kingdom figures, old bean, based on some number crunching and analysts' estimates. And maybe it's accurate. Regardless, it only serves to further illustrate how badly Microsoft has screwed up this tablet thing.

And where is the Microsoft we once knew? The company that nearly missed the Web and responded by destroying Netscape? The company that cornered the market for operating systems despite not actually inventing much of what would become the OS? The company that blew out Unix and kept Linux on the fringes? Where is the Microsoft that reacted to the market with urgency, swiftness and debilitating viciousness when it sensed that it might be losing its utter domination of a market it wanted to own?

This Microsoft is different -- big, slow, almost complacent in the face of mounting and genuinely threatening competition. This doesn't feel like a kinder, gentler Microsoft. It feels like an aging, darn near bumbling Microsoft, particularly when it comes to responding to competition in consumer-based product areas. It's just strange, and we can't put our finger on why it's happening...but it is.